Some panic began to set in when it was announced that Drake Baldwin would miss time with an oblique injury. Already down Sean Murphy for the next three months, one of the Braves’ primary catalysts to their 32-16 start instantly became the club’s most glaring deficiency.

The news that followed the next day eased some of those concerns, however. Calling it a mild Grade 1 oblique injury, Baldwin shouldn’t miss too much time — and to add onto that, the Braves offense hasn’t stopped rolling in his absence.

A lot of that has to do with the return of Ronald Acuña Jr. to the lineup. He came off the Injured List on the exact same day Baldwin was announced out, and in two games he’s been on base four times and scored four runs. The Braves essentially swapped one MVP-caliber player for another.

But even more impressive, Atlanta continues to get high-level production from players who were afterthoughts coming into the season. On Tuesday it was Mauricio Dubon, racking up three hits and delivering the go-ahead RBI in the eighth inning. Yesterday it was Dominic Smith, blasting his fifth home run of the season to go along with a triple, pushing his season average to an eye-popping .337.

The Braves simply have a really good baseball team. When one guy goes down, the next guy steps up and keeps the group churning out wins at an alarming rate. They’ve been doing it since Opening Day, and thinking it was ever going to stop — even with someone like Drake Baldwin going down — was a trap many of us fell into, most likely due to the PTSD from the last two seasons.

That said, we’re all sitting here waiting to see just how dangerous this team could look if everybody were healthy at the same time. That still hasn’t happened once all season — which is just fine in May — but hopefully that changes when the stakes are raised later in the year.

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(Photo by Brian Rothmuller/Icon Sportswire)